f a d e 衰
by precarious mind
Summary: .."Do I feel imaginary?" ..
1. the boy that is only air

**A/N:** New and improved plot, lovelies.

So, with my deepest and humblest apologies, I'm giving you the first three chapters, all at once.

Chyeah.

I like this plot, even though I don't really know where it ends, or what to do with it.

Maybe you guys can help…?

(Uck. The beginning came out terrible.)

**Disclaimer:** Psh. (Quote is from the novel My Sister's Keeper, by **Jodi Picoult**. BEST BOOK _**EVER**_ READ IT.)

**WARNINGS:** This applies to the fic in general. There will be drug _implications_, but implications only. No use. There will be violence. And general shadiness. Angst. Others.

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**f **a d e

**C** h a p t e r **O** n e

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_When I look up the girl who works at the Laundromat is standing over me, with her lip ring and blue streaked dreadlocks. "You need change?" she asks._

_To tell you the truth, I'm afraid to hear my own answer._

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the boy that is only air

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

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The first time I experienced death was when I was eleven. I was sitting on the stoop of my apartment building, watching nameless strangers pass and trying to guess their secrets.

That one, the teenager with shaggy hair that kept wincing every time a car honked or a child screamed, was either a tourist or suffering from a hangover. The older woman with the indentation on her leather belt from a handgun that's no longer there was a retired police officer. The toothpick-shaped man across the street who's holding flowers was pining after a beautiful Italian model that was too self-absorbed to return any affection.

And suddenly, a little girl stopped few feet away. Ragged and worn in a way only adults should be.

She had collapsed onto her knees, I remember, tearing her black stockings and sobbing like it would make her life a little less miserable.

I had walked over to her, a little unsure as all preteens are, meeting her at eye level when I kneeled next to her. The crowd split and surrounded us, an ocean parting.

Some businessman decked in an Armani suit, chatting away on some expensive looking cell phone bumped me with his briefcase as he passed, and scowled at me like it was my fault. I ignored him. The girl was still crying, and I reached out a hand tentatively.

"Hey," I had said. "What's wrong? Where are your mommy and daddy?"

At that, her drowning gasps had increased tenfold, and she began rocking back and forth.

I was about to go get an adult, someone with enough sense to _handle_ something like this, when she finally spoke up.

"Daddy says Mommy's gone and she's never coming back," she choked, scratchy-voiced.

The little girl had hair that shined like spun gold, and skin like milk. Her dress, it was a dark, dark green, whose color you could only see when the shadows shifted correctly.

Then I noticed the scar on her right cheek, bright and pink and the length of my index finger.

"Let me help you find your daddy. Where is he?"

She looked up at me then, and lifted a shaky finger to point down the busy street. A thin-framed woman holding a Pomeranian bumped into her outstretched hand, and she drew it back.

I turned. And understood, completely.

Down the street, that's where the funeral parlor was. The one with the white picket fence and obnoxiously bright display of flowers that were meant to cheer up the mourning, and the parking lot with more wrinkles and cracks than my science teacher's face.

"Oh," is all I said.

Shakily, trembling like a leaf, she had stood. "My name's Maria. And I shouldn't talk to strangers."

I smiled at her, but stopped because it felt like I was mocking her inability to join me. "You're a very smart girl, Maria. My name's Sakura."

She had bitten her lip, hands twisting the thick fabric of her dress. "That's a pretty name."

"Thanks."

"I'm gonna go back to Daddy now. I don't wanna make him more sad."

She turned to walk away.

"…Wait, Maria! Where did you get that scar from?" I couldn't let her go back if her father had done it to her, could I?

"When Mommy died, I was in the car." Her _R_'s almost sounded like _W_'s. (_So young_)

"I shoulda died instead."

Maria skipped away, with tear streaks stuck to her cheeks like dirt and runs in her stockings. I stood there, watched her leave, finally understanding just why stranger's kept their lives a secret from everyone walking down the street.

Two days later, I read a story in the newspaper. _Little Girl Killed by Crazed Father-Enraged by Wife's Death_, the headlines had said.

Witnesses say that after five-year-old Maria returned home from her mother's funeral, father Richard Simone did not allow her back into their home in the suburbs of Luther city. The girl reportedly banged on the front door until father came out with baseball bat and began-

_("I shoulda died instead.")_

_(So young)_

Death does crazy things to people.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"Hey. Hear about the new kid?"

"What about him?"

"My dad's friend is a detective, and he told me that his older brother is a _druggie_. Said we don't need anymore scum in our city, 'cause it's dirty enough as it is."

"Big surprise. The guy's as pale as a ghost. He's probably a crack head, too."

Laughter. "Probably."

They don't bother keeping their voices down. Every kid in the room hangs on their words, breathes them in as if they are oxygen.

Teenagers, are vultures.

I should know. I am one.

The new kid, sitting right next to the kids throwing slander at his name like mud, pushes his chair back. The room goes quiet. All eyes watch him as he leaves the classroom, face blank.

They have tied a noose around his neck.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

It isn't until the middle of class that the teacher realizes there is an empty seat when there shouldn't be. She lifts up the attendance sheet, adjusts her wire-framed glasses to stare down at it.

"That's odd," she says. "We were supposed to have a new student today. Has anyone seen Sasuke Uchiha?"

The room remains quiet. It is as if our throats have swelled shut.

"Anyone?"

How could we see someone, when they are invisible? When they _want_ to be invisible?

She shrugs. No one makes a noise for the rest of class, but at one point or another everyone manages to sneak a glance at the empty desk in the back of the room.

The day passes quickly. Sasuke Uchiha is in every one of my classes, but I never notice him until the teachers point out his existence.

The girls all like him. _Love_ him, they say, about this boy they don't even know. None approach him. They only whisper through cupped hands, or giggle as he passes.

A painting that's nice to look at, but never to touch.

Me, I couldn't care less. I have other things on my mind, things that don't involve staring at a boy like a piece of meat for me to pounce on.

_Don't be such a prude_, my mother would probably say. _Girls your age should be ogling guys, not treating them like a disease. Loosen up!_

(Easy for her to say.)

"Hey Sakura!"

I look up from picking at the thread hanging from my gym shorts to see Naruto walking towards me. His smile is brighter than any of the fluorescent lights above us.

Us, we've been friends since we learned to speak.

He jogs the rest of the way, untamed blond spikes bouncing, and is panting when he reaches me.

"Why are you late? You love gym."

His grin turns sheepish. He rubs the back of his neck, lets out a nervous laugh. "You know that water fountain in the teacher's lounge that exploded?"

I nod, slowly. The cogs in my head click everything into place.

"Yeah, well… turns out they weren't very happy about it. And, for some _odd _reason, they assume it was me."

I roll my eyes as the coach blows her whistle. We begin our warm-up jog, side by side.

"You know what else?" Naruto suddenly asks.

We slow our pace, just a little.

"Hm?"

"Know about that new guy?" he asks, predictable. He still looks forward as he runs.

"Who doesn't?"

"Yeah, I know. Everyone's been spewing crap about him all day. Anyway, they bagged him for skipping first period. He was in the Dean's office, chair next to mine."

"Oh," is all I say.

"I started talking to him. He's okay, I guess. Kind of a total ass, but okay."

I look over at him, a little awed that he approached someone who wants to be invisible, but then I remember that Naruto used to be invisible too. "What'd you talk about?" I ask.

"Well, I did most of the talking. You know I hate quiet."

He doesn't want to tell me the finer details, for some reason. Avoidance is something Naruto isn't good at.

"Naruto," I repeat, slowly, "What'd you talk about?"

He winces a little. A tall kid with mud-colored hair passes us, runs right between us and becomes a wall for two blurred seconds.

"Is was more _blurting_ than actual _talking_."

I groan. "You _didn't_. Tell me you didn't."

"I didn't mean to ask him! It just…slipped out."

"Exact words?"

He gulps. "Do I have to?" he asks, looking scared.

"Yes."

Deep breath. Hesitation. "I asked him if his brother was really a drug addict, or something like that."

I scowl at him. "For someone who makes friends so easily, that was a pretty idiotic way to introduce yourself."

He shrugs. "Slip of the mouth," he says.

I punch him, in the back of his head. "Slip of the fist," I say.

The coach blows her whistle. Every student, robots, stops their running and walks towards her.

She is holding a basketball against her round hip. She chucks it, hard, to a kid in the front.

"Find a partner," she calls out, voice like gravel, "and practice your passes."

"Ugh," I hear Naruto groan. "Drills _again_."

I snatch a basketball with a fair amount of air left in it, run my fingers over the goose pimple surface, bounce it twice. It stops a little short, but it's still useable.

We find an open spot in the gym, avoid getting hit in the head by a girl tossing her own ball with stick-on nails and too much eyeliner, and chuck the ball to each other.

Naruto, he's acting quieter than usual. Guilt, probably.

I eventually sigh, and pause mid-throw. "Naruto," I say slowly, "How'd he react?"

He looks startled, like he was spacing out. "Oh…uh…Sasuke, you mean?"

I nod.

He shrugs. "Didn't say anything back. I got called into the office right after I asked, but I have a feeling he wouldn't of said anything either way. It kinda makes me feel worse."

My eyes soften a little. "After school, apologize." Before he can protest, I hold up a hand and continue. "It'll make you feel better. I know you don't like making anyone feel bad."

He huffs, but follows up with a megawatt smile. "Fine. You're coming with me, though."

I throw the ball, chest pass, extra hard. He curls his body as it makes contact, arms wrapping around the basketball. ("_Oof_. _Son of a bi-"_) "Why?"

Rubbing his chest, still grinning, he says, "'Cause we both know I suck at saying sorry the right way."

That's a lie. Like all of us, Naruto is just scared of approaching the Unfamiliar.

One bounce pass into his groin later, I hiss, "_Fine_."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Naruto comes walking out of the boy's locker room a few seconds after I leave the girl's. He falls into step with me, looking excited.

"Guess what I did?" he asks.

I look at him, curious, and hike my backpack a little higher. "What?"

"I apologized, kinda, all by myself!"

I blink. "How?"

"Well, Sasuke was in the locker room and some of the guys were giving him a hard time with all of the rumors that're floating around. He was trying to ignore them, but they started getting annoyed and one of the assholes shoved him. Before some stupid brawl could start, I told the idiots to fuck off."

I blink, again. "Why was he in the locker room in the first place?"

Now Naruto looks confused. "Sakura, he's in our gym period. Didn't you see him? I don't think he had his clothes today, so he didn't change, but he was sitting against the wall the whole time. Right in front."

We make it to the front of the school, ignoring lockers and the sea of our peers drifting around us.

"I honestly didn't notice."

He shrugs. "Anyway, when I got rid of the meatheads, Sasuke was gone. I figure he forgives me, though."

"Naruto, you can't just _figure_ things like that. You're still apologizing."

He pouts, but I don't relent, so he scowls instead. "Fine. Then you're still coming with me."

I sniff. "Fair enough. But I'm only moral support; you're doing all the talking, got it?"

"…Control freak."

"Shut it. Before I shut it for you. Now, find Sasuke so you can show off that Uzumaki charm."

We scan the crowd flooding the front of the school, eyes looking for light skin and dark clothes, for any flash of the Unfamiliar.

"I don't see him," Naruto proclaims, shrugging it off. "Maybe tomorrow."

I frown, still straining my eyes. "For every day you put this off, I'm amputating a finger. Starting with your thumb."

He squeaks, very not-male-like, and nods frantically.

The crowd disperses slowly as kids work their way onto their buses. The yellow monstrosities pull away from the curb, exhaust leaving a smoky trail.

We look among the stragglers now.

"…There! See him?" Naruto shouts. He's pointing ahead.

I squint. "No," I tell him honestly. "I can't see him."

"Jeez, Sakura. He's not freaking _invisible_. He's right there, walking down the sidewalk."

I glare at him, but he's still looking where Sasuke must be. "Just lead the way," I finally sigh.

"Aye, aye, Captain!" he snorts, giving a mocking salute. I shove him, and we take off in a light jog away from the school and towards the boy I cannot see.

"Hey, Sasuke," shouts Naruto, ever confident.

Sasuke must not hear him, considering he has a pair of bulky headphones on and I can hear the strum of the bass guitar from here. We finally catch up and both end up on either side of him.

He lifts an eyebrow at us, turning from me to Naruto, and pulls the headphones down so that they rest on his neck.

He doesn't speak. The lack of initiation makes Naruto fidget. We've stopped walking by now, and I give my blond friend a pointed stare.

"Right," he mumbles, looking down and then up. He clears his throat. "I'm sorry for being an ass."

I nod my head in approval. Naruto looks relieved, like he would have lost sleep over this. I look at Sasuke, but his face is stone.

"What are you talking about?" he asks Naruto. The heavy music coming from his forgotten headphones reaches a guitar solo, and my toes wiggle in my shoes, in sync with it.

Naruto squirms again, uncomfortable and not expecting this.

"Naruto," I prod, like the mother I am.

"For what I said in the office this morning. I shouldn't of said it."

I feel as though I'm staring right through this Unfamiliar, with how blank he looks.

"Right," Sasuke says. "Do I know you?"

My brow furrows. Naruto gapes, stares, speaks.

"In the _Dean's_ office."

Sasuke nods, lifts his headphones so that they're over his ears again. "Oh," he murmurs, beginning to walk away. "_You're_ the idiot that was talking to himself."

Naruto reacts instantly; keeping pace with him, while it takes me a few extra seconds to catch up after the anger passes.

Naruto doesn't look too happy. "What's your problem?" he practically screeches, to be heard over the music. "I just saved you in the locker room, didn't I? If anything, you _owe_ me."

I cringe. Sasuke doesn't respond. A passing car honks at a jaywalking student.

"Naruto!" I scold. I move around Sasuke to get to him, hit him on the back of the head. "Don't lose your cool. Every time you get angry, you start acting impulsively!"

The two of us have stopped now, as Sasuke keeps walking, but I don't really notice.

"But _Sakura_," he whines. "Did you _hear_ him? I was trying to be nice!"

"Naruto, you and I both know that was far from nice, from either of you. Yes, I can see why you're angry. But how would you feel in his position?"

"Cruddy," he answers childishly, scuffing his feet on the concrete and staring downwards.

I nod my head. "Exactly. Now, go and apologize _properly_."

The two of us look up, ready to approach Sasuke again, but he is no longer there. It's as if he has disappeared- an apparition.

Naruto snorts. "Maybe the bastard _is_ invisible."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


	2. the heart that has stopped beating

**A/N:** It's annoying, doing all this at once. But, hey, you guys deserve it.

(Midterms are yet another torture method for teachers. Gah.)

Very important chapter ahead.

**Disclaimer: **I count my lucky stars that I don't have fans all over the world hounding me to release _drawings_, of all things. (Quote is from the amazing song _The Tide_ by **The Spill Canvas**.)

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**C** h a p t e r **T **w o

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_Heaven's not a place that you go when you die, it's that moment in life when you actually feel alive._

_So live for the moment._

_And take this advice, live by every word. Love is just a hoax, so forget anything that you have heard._

_And live for the moment now._

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the heart that has stopped beating

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

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When I was twelve, my dad left us- walked away like we didn't exist. My mom began crying herself to sleep every night, and I tried to pretend I couldn't hear her. But the walls weren't thick enough.

Me, I looked up through my skylight, right at the stars that floated like shards of broken diamond in a pool of ink, and wondered if my father saw the same thing. (Did it every night for a whole year.) Wherever he was.

When I finally built up enough stability, I asked my mom why he left.

She laughed, hollow. "Because, honey, your father was never a self-restrained kind of guy."

The smile she had given me was as cracked inside as it was outside.

"Bastard," she had sobbed next, and cried like only the heartbroken can, right over the spaghetti sauce she had been stirring.

We got Chinese that night. It tasted like ash in my mouth.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"Get _over it_ already."

I pause, shifting the cordless phone higher on my shoulder, pick up the wooden spoon, keep the pot steady with my free hand. The tomato sauce is alive with small bubbles and as red as blood.

I stir.

Naruto's squawking nearly makes me drop the spoon, cringing. "Did you ever stop and think he was having a bad day? …No, Naruto, you are _not_ tracking him down… Are you even _listening_ to me?"

I let out a frustrated sigh, as he babbles and drones.

Rolling my eyes, I lift some of the sauce to my lips, tip the spoon so that it runs into my mouth, and abruptly spit it out into the sink.

"That's _disgusting_."

The jumbled mess of words on the other line increases in volume.

"No, Naruto, that was _not_ directed at you."

I add more chopped garlic, some onion, a little dash of salt. I stir more.

"Okay, here's what's going to happen. I'll talk to him for you. I'll get him to understand. Happy?"

I taste the sauce again. I feel the need to vomit. Instead, I spit it into a napkin, drop it into the trashcan, and rinse my mouth with tap water.

"Yeah, I'm still here. Yes, I know I'm great. Yeah, and amazing." I smile. "Bye, Naruto."

I have signed a death wish, but I don't yet know this.

I empty the entire pot of tomato sauce into the sink, face twisted in disgust, and call up the closest Chinese delivery joint.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

My mom enters our apartment a few minutes later, humming and completely tone deaf.

"Hel-_lo_," she calls in a singsong voice, dancing into the kitchen.

I cross my arms, and tap my fingers along my biceps.

"Find any jobs?" I ask, eyebrow rising in question. She shakes her head, as expected. I sigh.

She purses her lips. "Well, don't sound so disappointed. I'll find _something_… eventually…"

I cross over to the cupboard, grab a glass, watch the led-filled water swirl into it from the tap at the sink. I take a good, long sip.

"How do you expect to find something," I begin, rolling my eyes, "when you wear _overalls_ to your interviews?"

She waves a dismissive hand, and wanders over to sit at the kitchen table, set for two (with an empty third seat).

I sit next to her. "Did you pay the bills?"

She rests her chin in her hand, elbow on table. "Yes, _mommy_."

"Don't be sarcastic. If I don't make sure things get done around here, who will?"

My mother, she used to be a professional kind of person. The kind who had a job that I couldn't pronounce, but was proud of anyway, and the kind that wore those unflattering skirt-suits just to put food on the table. She had a _briefcase_.

Now she's unemployed, ever since-

"You're going to die of old age before you turn _twenty_."

I scowl.

"So," she mocks further, "What's for dinner, _mother dearest_?"

"What else? Chinese, again."

"Yum. From Ginger's?"

"Duh."

"Shrimp fried rice?"

"Yes."

"Sesame chicken?"

"Yeah."

"Fried dog?"

"Yea- wait. What?"

She smiles, laughs airily. "Just making sure you were paying attention. Now, go blast your rap music until the downstairs tenants start poking their ceiling with broomstick handles. Or whatever it is you kids do these days."

I stand up. "Actually, I have homework. Plus, a chemistry quiz tomorrow. So, no annoying the downstairs tenants today. Sorry."

She sighs, dramatically. "It will have to wait then."

I nod. "Right. Just make sure you have some cash for the delivery guy."

She gets up, walks over to the fridge, opens the door. She mutters under her breath a little, and I see her rummaging in the bottom veggie drawer for something.

"Ah-hah! So that's where I left my wallet!"

Sure enough, she pulls out the bright purple change purse, right from between a stray piece of asparagus and clove of rotting garlic. She slams the fridge door shut, all smiles.

I shake my head. "I don't want to know."

I walk away from the kitchen, just as my mom starts hugging her wallet and singing _We Are the Champions _at such a high decibel that her glasses crack.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

It's the next morning, and I'm on my long solo-trek to school. The sun is barely peeking over the horizon, resting against the Earth and bleeding out its watercolors onto the blank canvas of sky.

You can still see the pale sliver of moon, high up there.

I finally reach that stupid hill, the one with the old tiny house at the top, the only place devoid of industrialization in this whole city, and grunt with the early-morning effort.

When I look up at the house, Sasuke Uchiha is coming out of the front door, headphones on. I blink, a little surprised, but not really. We reach his gate at the same time.

I open my mouth to speak, but he keeps walking, away. I catch up, tap his shoulder.

He pulls his headphones down. Scowling. Keeps walking, with me scrambling at his heels.

"What?"

My brow furrows. I huff. "Could you just walk a little slower?"

He rolls his eyes, but complies. "What?" he repeats.

"I'm Naruto's friend. That blond kid from yesterday, remember?" I say, just to be sure.

He's looking ahead, towards something I can't see.

"Fine. I'll humor you. What?"

I pause in my steps, falter, and almost lose him.

"Well, he's sorry about what he said to you, and sorry he overreacted yesterday."

He doesn't say anything else.

So, I continue. "And, uh…" Sort of.

"Right. That's nice."

I scowl. "Just tell me you forgive him, so I can appease the idiot."

"Tell the idiot that I don't give a shi-"

"Hey," I say. "Watch your mouth. There's a lady present."

He snorts. I still walk next to him.

I turn my head, cross my arms behind my back.

"You hair's blue," I say, smartly.

He still doesn't look at me. "And yours is pink. Are we done stating the obvious now?"

I scowl, again. "I was only saying that because yesterday I thought it was _black_. Asshole." I mumble the last part.

He puts his headphones back over his ears.

"Probably dip your head in ink," I mutter, glowering.

"Funny. I thought you fell into a cotton candy machine."

I smile at him. "So you _can _hear me."

"Obviously," he sneers.

The sun is up by now, and it gets into my eyes so that I can only see certain things without squinting, a glinting gold coin. Gray clouds swim around it, a storm on the way.

We walk in comfortable silence for a few minutes.

A shadow covers everything. The clouds are blocking out the sun.

I put my hood up a second before it begins to pour icy water. It's as if Sasuke doesn't even notice.

I lift my hand up, feel the droplets touch my palm and then melt away- the tears of an angel. I look over at Sasuke again, and notice something.

"I like your necklace," I say, shamelessly staring. It's a thin silver cross, engraved with some swirl of a design that makes you want a second look. It glints through the gray air.

Sasuke scowls, and tucks it under the collar of his black tee shirt.

I hike my backpack up a little higher, and suddenly feel very, very angry.

I explode.

"What's your _problem_?" I shout, stopping us in our tracks beside a shoddy old warehouse. The rain pounds harder, trying to drown me out, to drown me. "I'm trying to be _nice_ to you, and you're acting like I'm _annoying_? What did I ever do to you?"

"Nothing," he states, eyes slanting. "This is just how I act. And I didn't ask for your _charity_."

"You aren't even worth the effort," I shout more, not really knowing who I'm screaming at anymore.

"Like I haven't heard _that_ before." My gut twists a little at that, but I don't get any less angry. "It's your fault for wasting your 'effort'. The last thing I want is your pity."

"It isn't pity! I'm just trying to be _nice_!"

"Be nice somewhere else." He begins to walk away, but I grab his arm to stop him. He shoves his headphones off, and they fall to the pavement, right into a puddle. A small splash soaks the bottoms of my jeans. My hand stays on his arm

The rain has become deafening.

"Would it _kill you_ to act like you actually care?"

He finally turns around, quick as a flash, so that he's right in front of me, and opens his mouth to speak-

_**BANG.**_

_**BANG.**_

Sasuke's eyes go wide, too wide, and something splatters onto my cheek. My heart, it leaps to my throat.

Sasuke crumples, falls onto the sidewalk and right into the puddle beside his headphones, and I hear running footsteps fading away from us through the rain and my screams. I'm still clutching his arm, and God, I feel so numb as my knees hit the slippery concrete.

His blood, so red, leaks from his head, and his back. It mingles with the water, swirling like crimson paint, and I'm still screaming.

My tears mingle with the rain as it pelts my face, and I shake his unresponsive body, and no, _no_, this isn't happening.

"_HELP_!" I scream, my voice cracking. "SOMEBODY _HELP_!"

I turn his body over, bring my fingers to look for a pulse, but I can't find it. I try his wrist, my fingers shaking. His skin is going paler. He feels cool to the touch.

There is no pulse, no jump of the skin to tell me his heart is still beating.

"_HELP_!"

I wipe my tear-stained cheek, smearing blood across it. Sasuke's eyes are half-mast, and blank.

(He probably died before he hit the pavement)

"_HELP_!"

I try staunching the flow, a hand on each bullet wound, but it keeps running. How can someone have so much blood?

My backpack has spilled, all over, homework disintegrating into a white pile of ink and nothingness. My eyes are blurring- as if I'm looking through stained glass. My heart is beating faster than a hummingbird's.

The slick blood runs between my curled fingers, red on white.

(He's not _moving_)

"_HELP_!"

The rain tries to drown me.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


	3. the girl that can not cry

**A/N:** Um.

Just to be clear, there are still many similarities between this plot and the old one, except for the genre.

Yeah.

(Why yes, I _am_ a loser to the nth power. Thanks for noticing.)

**Disclaimer:** I asked. Kishimoto said _**no**_. So now I write fanfiction to torture and butcher his characters. Revenge is sweet. (Quote is from the awesome song _Dead!_ by **My Chemical Romance**.)

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**f **a d e

**C** h a p t e r **T **h r e e

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

_If life ain't just a joke, then why are we laughing?_

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the girl that can not cry

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

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My second experience with death happened when I was in the car with my mother. We were driving home from my grandparent's house, first time without my dad.

It was dark, black as pitch, and we were on the highway. The high beams of our rented car pierced through the night like lightning. It was raining.

The car lurched.

It swerved for a second, and my mom slammed on the brakes, white-knuckled.

My heartbeat frantic, I looked up through the front windshield. A deer lay on the road, motionless.

My mom only stared at it, impassive, hands dropping to her side. Something in her finally snapped.

She slammed her hands on the horn, beeping at an unseen enemy, thrashed around in her seat like a child having a tantrum.

"_Why me_?" I remember her shouting, face flushed.

I caught my bottom lip between my teeth, and averted my eyes back to the road.

"Is it dead?" I asked.

Her breathing was ragged, unsteady. "Does it _look_ dead?"

I slid down a little further in my seat.

"Sorry." I mumbled.

"No, no," she said, fingers running through her hair. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't of snapped at you. I'm just wound a little tight, you know?"

"Yeah."

I looked over at the deer, again. It looked so _young_, so full of an unfulfilled future.

"Too bad its family wasn't here to save it," she murmurs, switching gears and driving away. "It might've survived."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

His body is still on the sidewalk, covered in a plastic tarp.

Someone should of put a blanket there instead, I think, but then I remember that he can't feel the cold.

The rain's stopped. The city is still basked in a silver glow, dead and grim.

There are people, a crowd full. They're on the other side of the police line – _Do Not Cross_- all school kids and mothers and vultures and people on their way to work. Reporters are there, too, with cameras and taking pictures.

I feel sick to my stomach, where I'm sitting on the step of the ambulance. There are three police cruisers, cops all over.

I don't know who finally called them.

(They had to pry me off of Sasuke, cold and dead, where I held his sweatshirt sleeve. I was still screaming.)

Two people walk over to me. One's a man, with olive skin and an unlit cigarette tucked behind his ear. The other is a woman, pale and long and pretty, with curly black hair and nondescriptive clothes.

She smiles at me, lipstick crimson and teeth like pearls-

(_the slick blood runs between my curled fingers, red on white_)

-and says, "Hey there. My name's Kurenai. This is my partner, Asuma. We're detectives."

I nod, still numb, eyes on ground.

This time it's the man that speaks, eyes and voice soft. "Sakura, do you mind telling us what happened?"

My voice is ruff and hoarse. I stopped crying a while ago.

(_I wipe my tear-stained cheek, smearing blood across it_)

The rain washed all the blood away, cleaned my skin.

"…I don't really know."

Kurenai goes down on one knee, looks me straight in the eye, puts a hand on my shoulder. I shiver.

"Honey, what's his name?"

I bite my lip. "Sasuke Uchiha."

I see the two of them make eye contact for a second, and wonder if I have said something wrong.

"We were going to school," I say, voice scratched. "I don't know him really well. He just transferred here a day ago. My friend and him had a sort of disagreement, so when I saw Sasuke on my way I started talking to him, tried to explain things."

I pause, take a deep breath. They nod for me to continue.

"We were okay, walked for a while, talked a little. Then we started arguing. That's when…when…" My throat swells shut. I burst into tears, sobbing.

Kurenai goes to touch me, comfort again, but I push her away. "Someone _shot_ him. I heard footsteps running away after it happened. Then, there was just so much _blood_…"

(_it mingles with the water, swirling like crimson paint, and I'm still screaming_)

"I…checked for a pulse. But…"

(_there is no pulse, no jump of the skin to tell me his heart is still beating_)

I choke on my sobs. I cradle my face in my hands; wear my heart on my sleeve in front of these strangers.

Kurenai sits next to me, rubs small circles on my back. "Shh," she whispers, a breeze of comfort.

Asuma nods. "You did good, kid." He smiles at me, but it doesn't help. I keep crying.

"A brother," I finally manage to choke out. "I think he has a brother. Maybe. It could just be rumors. They made up a lot of rumors about him."

Asuma nods, again. He grabs the uniform sleeve of a passing officer. "Call the school and get the contact information for Sasuke Uchiha."

The man walks off, Asuma follows to continue his investigation elsewhere. Kurenai leaves shortly after, but not before offering me a contact card and small smile.

I pocket the card, ignore the smile.

"_Sakura_!"

And there's my mother, pushing police officers out of the way to run towards me from the taxi she just left.

"Hey lady!" the driver calls. "You have to pay!"

My mother ignores him, and finally gets to me. The cops back off when they see us hug.

"Oh, _God_," she murmurs, " I was so worried. I thought something had happened to you. I thought you were _hurt_."

I don't answer. My eyes stay glued to Sasuke's body, the tarp discarded. The photographers have a field day, snapping until their fingers cramp. The detectives from before pace around it, Kurenai shakes her head. _Too young_, I read from her painted lips.

My mother sits beside me. There is silence.

"Who was he?" she finally asks.

They move him into the body bag, and up goes the zipper. Finality.

My eyes feel dead, so I don't look at her.

"Just a kid," I say.

One of the officers calls my mom over, to question her. I sit alone.

"Can someone _please_ tell me what's going on?" I hear someone shout. It echoes above everything else.

My heart stops. My breath catches. I am hallucinating.

There is Sasuke Uchiha, standing right next to a man in white as they load his body into a van. He looks scared, confused, _emotional_.

But there can't be two of him. That is his body they just loaded- his cold, long-dead body.

He goes from person to person, asking, shouting, pleading. No one takes notice of him, and no one reacts.

Invisible.

He finally sees me looking at him, stalks over. I gasp.

His eyes have turned into a bright, burning red.

His clothing is the same, the wounds are gone, the blood too.

His headphones are around his neck.

"What…" I breathe, breathless at the same time.

He stares at me, hard. "You can see me?"

I nod, skin prickling. "You're _dead_."

He rubs his face. "I should be. I've gathered that much, thanks. Now can you tell me why I can see my own 'dead' body?"

I shake my head, lose the words I was about to say, and say something else. "…I'm imagining this. I feel guilty, or depressed, or _something_, and my messed up psyche is making me _imagine_ this."

He shoots forward, grabs my wrist, lifts it to my face. He shoves my hand onto his chest, and I can't feel a heartbeat. But he still radiates heat.

"Do I _feel _imaginary?" he asks, voice serious. I shake my head. "Then I'm not fucking imaginary."

This isn't real. This can't be real. I was there, I saw the blood pool around him and the light die in his eyes. He is _dead._

"Why can't anyone else see you, then?"

He drops my hand. "If I knew that, I wouldn't be asking you."

My head begins to spin. The world goes a little dizzy.

"You're eyes are red."

"Hn. I'm aware."

I shake my head, stubborn. "No. I'm not believing this. I'm not seeing a ghost. I'm not being haunted."

"I'm not haunting you. I'm asking for help. And who says I'm a ghost?"

"What else would you be?" I ask, in a daze. The world still dips and loops.

He shrugs. "Not a ghost."

I look at him, and he's sort of glowing, like an angel. "Then why's your skin look so pale?"

He shrugs, again.

"Maybe I'm just fading."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


	4. the message without a bottle

**A/N:** Hey there.

Um. Hiatus is now over?

But updates for this will be considerably slow. Working on other stories. All that jazz.

_**To be clear:**_ Not every part in this will be in Sakura's point of view. Her's will be the only one in first person, though. Everything else is in third.

**Disclaimer:** Naruto owns _me_. (Quote is from the totally twisted ancient Greek play _Oedipus the King_.)

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**f **a d e

**C** h a p t e r **F **o u r

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_Whatever is sought for can be caught, you know, whatever is neglected slips away._

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the message without a bottle

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

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I was seven when Naruto Uzumaki moved to our city. I was still seven when everyone decided he was an Untouchable, someone not worth talking to. I was ten when we became friends.

I still remember one day, in the fourth grade, that he had first made me laugh.

Our teacher had been sitting at her desk, the bird-like stern thing that she was, and had announced that she would call our names out alphabetically. If we had done our homework, we were to say _yes_ and if we hadn't our parents would be getting a call and you had to stay in for recess and the rest of the classroom could feel free to laugh at you.

Everyone simply called her The Pigeon back then I remember, because her given name was really Miss Figgon. Never to her face though. That was dangerous.

Naruto hadn't done his homework. Everyone laughed, she called his home, and he had to stay in while we all went out to play hopscotch and tag and Chase the Boys.

The next day, Naruto raised his hand before the Pigeon even began calling out names.

"Would you punish me for something I didn't do?" he had asked, sounding so tiny and innocent.

"Of course not," she had snapped back.

Then his look had turned disturbingly double-edged. "Promise?"

She had sighed, rubbed the reddened bridge of her nose, and looked at him over the rim of her buggy glasses.

"I _promise_. Now sit back down before I call your house again."

He nodded, grinning madly.

Naruto's name was last, and when she called it out he stood up and proudly proclaimed, "Miss Pigeon, I didn't do my homework."

I laughed.

She had promised.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Sasuke sits next to me now, looking unfazed and completive.

"It was definitely a planned hit," he murmurs, and I wonder if he forgets I'm right here. "No way an amateur could have hit two vital points through the rain and barely any light."

I stand, shaking my head. It's too much. It's all too much.

"Get away," I hiss, blood pulsing.

He looks up at me, shaken out of his world. "What?"

"I'm not helping you," I snap, "I'm not crazy. I'm not seeing you. This is all just a case of survivor's guilt, or something."

He stands too, and looks down at me now.

"As far as I can see, you're the only person that can see and hear me. I don't exactly want to ask anything from you either, but there's no other choice."

"Not for you. But me, I'm going to forget this ever happened."

I take a deep breath and turn away to search for my mom.

It's too much.

He grabs my shoulder and turns me right back around.

"Jesus Christ, I'm _dead_! And you're just going to act like this is nothing, like it doesn't matter that I'm still _here_? It _does_, and whether you like it or not you're involved just as much as I am, and we need to figure this out."

"And if we do? If we do somehow figure this out? What then, huh?" I ask, fuming at the shadow of the dead boy.

The shadow speaks. "Then I'll disappear." He pauses to point at the crowd of city-livers gathered by the barriers. "And you can go on with your life like the rest of them."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I walk over to my mother in a daze.

_One day_, Sasuke had said before walking away._ Make a decision. If you show up at the top of the hill at noon tomorrow, then I'm assuming you'll help me. If not, then have a great life._

He had said _life_ like it was a curse.

I'm starting to think it is.

"Sakura."

My mom is standing right in front of me and snapping her fingers like a hypnotist releasing their victim.

My voice cracks as I say, "Let's go home."

"You okay, sweetie?"

"Yeah. Please, I just want to leave."

She gives me a worried glance. "Sure," she finally says. "Let's go then."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

The police escort us through the crowd of buzzards. I wince at the cameras, microphones, tape recorders, as they are all shoved into my face and my mom shoves them all back with a maternal glare.

At one point, I am swallowed whole by the people, eyes wide with curiosity, with amazement, with the thought that they may get on the front page of the paper, deliver the report on the six o'clock news, be the first to spread the true story.

I am bewildered, and they swarm me.

"_Was he your friend?"_

"_Is it true that he and his older brother were involved with drugs?"_

"_Were the two of you romantically involved?"_

"_Is there anything you wish you had the chance to say to him?"_

"No comment."

My mother has come back to pull me away by the wrist. My eyes remain wide.

I am pushed into a bright yellow taxi, and my expression doesn't change as I stare out the window at the pseudo-paparazzi.

"Drive."

And they fall back as we pull away from the curb.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I sit in the living room, looking at a made-for-TV-movie without really watching it. Every light is off. It is still dismal-gray outside.

"Honey," Mom calls from the kitchen. "Dinner is ready."

We are eating early, if only to keep me occupied. I stand, and walk, and sit down at the table. I pick up my fork, and poke at my mashed potatoes with little interest, mind elsewhere, as I feel my mom's stare on my face.

"Sakura," she says. "Sweetheart, are you okay?"

I fake a smile for her. "Fine."

"Are you sure?" She sighs, turning to face me fully. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

I can almost laugh at the irony of that statement. "Yeah, I'm good. Really. Just a little shaken up."

"Alright. If you want to talk about anything, anything at all, you-"

Gazing at the redred_red_ blood leaking from my steak, I snap, "I said I'm fine!"

She looks hurt.

The phone begins to ring. Once, twice, three times, and I'm standing to stare at the caller ID before the fourth one ends.

"Naruto," I mutter, unsurprised, and take the cordless into my bedroom.

"Hello?"

"_Sakura!"_

"Hey, Naruto. What's up?"

"_Thank God. You're okay, right? Not hurt or anything?"_

"No."

"No _like 'I'm not okay' or _no_ like 'I'm not hurt'?"_

I sigh, fidgeting on my bed. "A little of both, I guess."

"_I… okay. Wanna talk?"_

"Not really. How was school?"

"_Without you? Boring… Uh, everyone was kind of talking about what happened. You know, it got around pretty fast. You…uh, better be careful. I have a feeling people are gonna, like, attack you when you come back."_

Either that or avoid me like the plague. "I guess. I don't think I'm going in tomorrow."

"_Oh, really? That's good. Just don't, you know, _dwell _on it or anything."_

"Ooh. Big word. Iruka teach you that?"

"_Ha. Funny girl."_

"Yeah, well…" I think for a second, now that it's a bit less awkward. "Hey, Naruto?"

"_Yeah?"_

"Would you… do a favor for me?"

"_Of course!"_

It's the trust in his voice that almost makes me change my mind. I bite my lip. "Will you cover for me tomorrow?"

"…_What'd you mean?"_

"I mean, if my mom calls your house for anything. Could you just tell her I'm there, in the bathroom or something?"

"_Huh? Why? Sakura, what are you gonna do?"_

"Just for tomorrow. Please Naruto." _Please._

"…_Fine. But I won't like it!"_

"Thanks, Naruto. I really, really appreciate it."

"_God, Iruka's gonna throw a fit if he finds out…"_

"Then don't let him find out."

"_Yeah, yeah, easy for you to say."_

"Thanks again. Really."

"_Ah, whatever. Just…be careful tomorrow, okay?"_

"Good night, Naruto."

"_G'night Sakura! Don't let the bed bugs bite!"_

I hang the phone and hang my head. I don't deserve a friend like him.

Next, I drag my sorry self back to the dinner table. My mom is washing her own plate, and mine sits, cold, staring back at me.

When I sit, I do not touch it.

"I'm sorry," I say.

From the corner of my eye, I see her smile.

"I know."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"It was a planned hit, most likely. Our sources say his older brother is involved in drugs."

Kurenai looks over at Asuma as he asks, "A deal gone wrong then?"

She shrugs. "Probably. But we won't be sure until we find out the truth."

The chief's door is pushed open abruptly, and he steps out with a stern, hard look in his eye.

"Asuma, Kurenai. In my office, now."

Sparing each other a brief glance, they stand from their desks, and follow Sarutobi inside. Shizune is already in there, holding an evidence bag with a gun held in it, looking distinctly uncomfortable.

Kurenai cocks her head a bit. "We found the murder weapon already?"

Sarutobi nods. "About two blocks north of the crime scene. But that's not why I called you in here."

He passes them each a sheet of paper.

"What's this?"

"A photocopy of the note we found with it."

They look down at the paper.

"_I'll be back to finish my job_," Asuma reads out loud.

"Oh, God," Kurenai gasps, "we need to get a patrol car down to that Haruno girl's apartment right now."

Sarutobi nods. "Already done."

Asuma chews hard on his toothpick. "We gonna inform them?"

"Not at the moment."

"When?"

"When the situation calls for it, I suppose."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Itachi is sitting at his kitchen table, head in hands, thinking, _It's all my fault._

Sasuke sits across from him. Face blank.

They have been sitting here since Itachi identified the body.

(_"That's my brother," he had said, cold, calculating, as usual_._ "That's Sasuke."_)

"It's funny," Sasuke says, and imagines he might as well be speaking to an empty room. "You're the one person that never considered me invisible."

He swipes a hand forward, and it goes right through his brother, flickering like a disrupted hologram.

"And now you can't see me at all."

(no one can)

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


	5. the promise that remains unspoken

**A/N:** OH SWEET JESUS. The advertisements on this website are very, very stupid. And annoying.

ZWINKY. VANCE VANCE REVOLUTION. COME FIND YOUR CLASSMATE.

Oh, oh, and who could forget this little treasure? _Slap the sumo wrestler's belly to find out who your crush is._

Because that's so romantic. Really.

Anyway, in response to a couple reviews, this story will not lose its dark tone.

You guys really deserve a better chapter. But I re-typed this like twenty times, so here it is.

**Disclaimer:** You see SasuSaku happening in the series anytime soon? Yeah, I thought not. (Quote is from Shakespeare's _The Tempest_; Act 4, Scene 1.)

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**f **a d e

**C** h a p t e r **F **i v e

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_Our revels now are ended. These our actors, __  
__As I foretold you, were all spirits, and __  
__Are melted into air, into thin air: __  
__And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, __  
__The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces, __  
__The solemn temples, the great globe itself, __  
__Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve, __  
__And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, __  
__Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff __  
__As dreams are made on; and our little life __  
__Is rounded with a sleep._

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the promise that remains unspoken

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

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I was looking at an album cover, a cool one that was just a little old. I ran my hands over it. Cocked my head to one side. Flipped it over.

On the back was a picture of a man in black and white, all artsy in his shaggy clothes and messy hair. A list of song titles hung over his head.

I walked into the kitchen, where Mom was cooking dinner, CD still in my hand.

"Hey," I said, watching the stir fry sizzle and hiss. I lifted up the album and pointed to the picture of the man. "Who was this guy?"

She glanced at it briefly. "Him? He was a famous rock star in the eighties and nineties." She glanced at it for a moment more, eyes lingering on his picture and nostalgia flowing into her eyes like I had opened a floodgate. "I went to a couple of his concerts. He was _amazing_ live." Paused once more. "I met your father at one of them."

"Oh."

"Where'd you find that old thing anyway?"

"It was on the rack."

"Really? Thought I'd gotten rid of it…"

Sizzle. Hiss. Like a snake.

I placed the album down on the counter, near the stove. My mom picked it up, and walked towards to the garbage. I sat at the empty table.

"Is he still in the business?" I asked, as Mom opened the trash lid.

She stopped. "No," she said. She dropped it into the can and slammed the top closed.

"He committed suicide."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I sit in the kitchen with my mom, still. It remains quiet, but it's the cozy kind. The one that doesn't really bother you.

Her eyes are closed, and she smiles all of a sudden. They open behind the windows of her glasses, and the grin is directed towards me.

"How 'bout some ice cream?"

I give her a feeble excuse of a half-smile.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Asuma chews thoughtfully on his toothpick, rolling a fresh one between his fingers, an odd habit he has had since he quit smoking.

(since she _made_ me quit smoking)

"Something on your mind?" Kurenai asks, quirking one slender eyebrow.

"I've been thinking…" he murmurs.

She interrupts with a snort. "There's something new."

He shoots her a sour look. "Anyway, I've been thinking about the Uchiha case."

"And?"

"The killer's note. I mean, you said the older brother was involved with drugs, right? That means Sasuke was killed as… punishment? Payment? I don't know. But there's no way that Haruno girl saw the perp in that lighting. So what if-"

"You don't think…?"

"Yeah, I do. I mean, _finish the job_? What if it isn't the girl that they're targeting next? What if it's- "

"The older brother."

"Exactly."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

After about an hour of watching his brother mourn and break down, Sasuke falls into a sort of haze that is far from sleep. He slumps in his chair with half-lidded eyes, lips moving and saying nothing

(everything)

in silent gusts of air. Thinking,

(he flashes around to face her)

(_bangbang_)

(intense searing hurting pain pain pain everywhere screaming)

(_you're dead_)

(cold and dark and she's clutching him)

and… seeing?

_Scraaaaaape._

Itachi pushes his chair back, and stands to leave. Sasuke sits up, blinking.

(i just saw my own death)

He follows his brother, shaking his head, and tries to decipher the weird look in Itachi's eyes.

First the hall closet. A locked, black box is pulled out, the one Brother always _always_ told him not to touch. Walking again.

Stopping in Sasuke's bedroom.

Placing the box on the dresser. Open it. Pulling out a standard-issued handgun that was given to _protect and serve_.

(just like daddy)

Standing in front of the mirror. Full Length. No Tricks.

Holding the gun to his head, and unlocking the safety.

And Sasuke steps up behind his brother. "Don't do it," he says, looking at the family remains in the reflection, feeling panic rise with bile. "You're no coward. Don't do it."

The barrel -_just ever so slightly_- is pushed harder into his temple.

"Don't do it Itachi. Don't kill yourself."

The lightest of pressure on the trigger, a centimeter, two.

"_Don't_."

A rattling ringtone fills the room, and Sasuke holds his breath. His brother reaches into his pocket, and slips the cell phone out with his free hand. His eyes never leave the mirror, even when answering.

Epitome of determination.

"Yes?"

"_Hey, Itachi_." Kisame, Sasuke thinks. The one with the sharp teeth and beady eyes. Weird skin. His brother's partner in crime. "_Heard 'bout the runt. Sorry 'bout that_."

The gun droops a little. "Hn."

"_The boss wanted me to tell you that he still expects that job done on time. You know the one_."

"Of course. I expected nothing less."

"_Yeah, figured that. The thing is, he wants it done tonight now_."

The gun drops further, and Sasuke watches his brother's pale shaking fingers tighten around it.

"Why is that?" Itachi asks, eyes leaving the mirror in their narrowing.

(If Sasuke could still breathe, he would have sighed in relief.)

"_Says he wants to talk to you after_."

His brother is silent for a while. Then he puts the gun down, carefully, deliberately.

"He knows something."

"_Knows? Knows something 'bout what?_"

"My brother."

"_Hey man, I don't know nothin' 'bout that. Pretty stupid of you to say it, though. You know he probably has your phone bugged_."

"I want him to hear. I want him to know that if he had _any_ part in it, he be-"

"_Watch what you say, man. Be at the lot in twenty minutes if you wanna keep your head_."

Itachi bites his lip, snaps his phone shut, and slips it back into his pocket. Sasuke watches him with careful eyes, black and wary.

His brother leaves the room. He can hear the footsteps fade down the hall and steps, and the front door slam closed.

The gun lies forgotten on the dresser.

Without thinking, Sasuke walks forward, picks it up, and puts it in the one place his brother will never find it.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I lie in my bed without sleeping, head clouded with so many thoughts that it's overwhelming.

I really just don't know.

I barely know this boy.

But I watched him die.

He's a stranger to me.

But I watched him _die_.

If I had died, would he do it for me?

If I had died, wouldn't I want the same thing?

I flip over under my sheets, frustrated, and bury my face into my pillow to block out the city lights coming in from under my blinds.

Sure, it would be morally correct. Theoretically, maybe. But there's a difference between saying you would do the right thing and actually doing it.

There's a difference between ethics and self-preservation.

My eyelids have yet to get heavy.

I shift onto my side, the blankets falling to pool around my waist, my arms bent out in front of me and my hands falling on top of each other.

I close my eyes.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I wake up in the same position and only then realize that I looked like I was praying.

For what, I can't say.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I tell my mom I'm not ready to go back to school today, and she buys it. She cooks me pancakes for breakfast, and I only eat two from the whole big batch.

Every day, my mom goes out on a job hunt. She usually fails. But she still _always_ goes.

Today, she offers to stay home.

No, I tell her. I'm fine.

She insists.

I want to be alone for today, I finally tell her.

She insists some more.

I plead, and manage to bring myself to tears somewhere in the middle.

She leaves.

It is still early, so I take a shower, and take my time getting ready.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Itachi still isn't home.

Sasuke notes this dully, and remains sitting on the porch steps as he has done all night.

He tells himself he isn't worried, and his hand slips into his pocket slowly.

He watched the sunrise this morning. He hasn't done that for a while. It was different from a good country sunrise. It was blocked and distorted by the tops of skyscrapers and the murky film of smoke over the sky, a blackened bleeding coin of gold suspended in dark fog.

He knew he would hate this place. That's the last thing he had told his brother. How much he _hated_ coming back here. Then he'd left for school, and never came back.

He had a dark feeling that he never _would_ come back. But it was worth a try, if that girl even showed up.

Which he doubted.

Sasuke wonders if death gave him this pessimism or if it just made it more pronounced.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I go down the street and pause when I reach the hill.

Because, this is it. I either turn away now, or make the commitment.

I almost trip when I start walking up the pavement, as if my feet are warning me. But I keep going.

When I reach the top and look towards the house, Sasuke is sitting on the stone steps and his hand is playing with the cross around his neck that I complimented moments before his death. The other is in his pocket.

"Hey," I call, walking up and avoiding his bright red eyes. "I…I came, I guess."

He doesn't look at me either, gaze trained on something in the distance. "Obviously."

We remain in silence, no wind there to carry us back into conversation.

Sasuke clears his throat and looks at me for a second before his eyes find the same distant spot again. "Did you make a decision?"

I stare at him awkwardly. It's so much easier to look at people when their eyes are off of you.

"Yeah," I tell him quietly.

A red car zooms by on the street, stereo cranked up to an obnoxious level, and then disappears.

"Well?" he asks me.

I sit next to him on the stoop, and no more words are spoken.

But I think he gets it.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


	6. the calm within a storm

**A/N:** Bleck. I just couldn't write this chapter. IT. IS. TRASH.

(Out of curiosity, any of you think you have an idea of who the killer is?)

**Disclaimer:** Let's settle for the classic, _I don't own it, _because I feel very uncreative at the moment. (Quote is from Neil Young's _Hey Hey, My My. _Classic song, guys.)

**O**

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**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**f **a d e

**C** h a p t e r **S **i x

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

_It's better to burn out than to fade away._

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

the calm within a storm

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**O**

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**O**

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I have one of those real distant memories from when I was around five or six. The type that is very fuzzy and very far away, and very hard to describe when someone asks you about it.

I hadn't been able to fall asleep; the downpour outside and random bursts of roaring thunder wouldn't let me. My dad wasn't home.

_Working late_, he had told my mom.

_Yeah, right_, she had said back.

This is really where everything starts getting vague.

I don't remember the time the front door opened. All I know is that it was past my weekend bedtime, which had been eight at the time. Eight thirty if my mom was feeling especially charitable.

It had seemed very late to me.

I also don't remember if my mom was waiting in the living room awake or asleep, or the exact words that were argued about when my dad finally stepped inside.

I think that was around the time my parents grew more distant towards each other. My father kept coming home later and later and later.

But that first night, while my parents were arguing, I do remember looking out the window, with my hands cupped over my ears to drown out the yells. I was going to see if the rain had stopped yet.

It hadn't.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"So…where do we start?"

Sasuke finally turns to look at me, gaze blank, and I stare into his crimson eyes as long as I can before turning away.

_I_ think it was an appropriate question.

"Start?" he asks back.

"Well," I say dumbly, feeling incredibly awkward in my skin and oddly nauseous, "We do have to start _somewhere_."

I hear him grunt, and feel him turn away from me.

"How am I supposed to know?" he eventually murmurs, leaning against the pole that helps support the slanting roof above the porch.

I feel myself wilt a little, and lean against the opposite pole, facing the street. "We should figure some stuff out first, I guess," I tell him helpfully. I trace a dark, wooden vein that runs through the surface of the old column with the tip of my index finger, biting my lip.

"Like…?" I hear him ask.

"Like," I say, then pause for thinking. I turn back to him "Like, who do you think…"

I gesture at his specter-like form, too afraid to say it.

"Killed me?" he finishes harshly.

I swallow the knot in my throat and nod.

A gust of wind, too cold for a breeze, brushes past us. My hair blows up around me before landing back against my shoulders and neck. My clothes rustle quietly and fall back against my pale skin, dotted by goose bumps.

I shiver.

Nothing on Sasuke moved.

"I don't know," he says, closing his redred eyes, which I am thankful for. He puts his hands behind his head, elbows bent, and lies down, feet resting on the step below him.

I bite my lip again.

"Who would have a _reason_?" I ask next, still not saying the word.

"I don't know," he says again, voice bored.

"Okay," I sigh patiently. "Do you have any… enemies?"

He snorts. I cringe.

He brings his hands back around and laces them over his chest. "Do I really need to answer that?"

I don't look at him, and instead scratch a small spot on my ear uncomfortably.

I hear him sigh.

"None," he says, and I turn just in time to see that he has opened one eye halfway, and is now looking at me. "That I'm aware of."

I cough a little.

"And… you, ah, your brother?"

He opens his other eye.

"Has nothing to do with this," he finishes for me, closing his eyes again.

I furrow my brow, then mutter, "Of course not."

He smirks.

It is quiet again, and we just sit there. Another car passes, an old gray model that I sort of recognize. An old woman is driving it, and there are groceries sitting in the back seats.

"Can I ask you a question now?" he asks me after a few more minutes of heavy, tiring silence.

"Uh," I say, blinking a couple of times. "Yeah. Sure."

He sits up and looks me in the face.

"What's your name?"

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"You disappoint me." The dark silhouette leans back in the chair, candles flickering and making shadows sway in the dimly lit room, the air heavily laden with dust and cheap musky cologne. "Such a mistake… it's unforgivable."

"I'm aware of my error, and fully intend to remedy it."

"You better." Eyes flicker dangerously. "Or you will be replaced."

"Of course, sir."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

Asuma and Kurenai get a tip from a reliable source and immediately drive to one of the elder Uchiha's usual haunts, hungry for information.

It's a shady bar on the dirtiest side of town, so stereotypically dingy and suspicious that it hurts. Kurenai gets her share of appreciative looks from dirty men with reddened skin and too few teeth, but the scowl on her face is discouraging enough to freeze fire. It makes Asuma slightly proud.

The boy (because he really is just a boy to them, even if he is over twenty) sits on a stool, his pale fingers curled around a glass that could be water or vodka.

The two detectives both slide onto the stools on either side of him, Kurenai on the right and Asuma on the left, and Itachi Uchiha lifts his head but does not look at them.

"Detectives," he greets slowly, voice deep, recognizing them from the body identification.

Asuma nods, a motion of greeting, while Kurenai moves straight to the point.

"We have some questions," she says, softly and not unkind, but straightforward because she is that type of woman.

Itachi knocks back the rest of his drink, it must be alcohol, Asuma thinks, and says no more.

"Where were you when your brother was shot?"

Itachi gestures to the bartender for another, eyes trained on the yellowed wall and cheap-framed advertisements with dispassionate eyes. "I assume," he begins, "that you think it has something to do with me?"

"We always—"

"— look at the family first, I know." Itachi knocks back another drink, blinking slowly and with purpose. He still refuses to look at the detectives, picking up his empty glass and staring through the dusty bottom of it, looking at the blurred colors of the bar top through it. "Our parents died quite some time ago, so I suppose…" He leaves the end of the sentence to hang in the air, as if it has no purpose.

Kurenai leans forward and crosses her legs. "…Your alibi?" she prods.

Itachi puts the glass back down and finally turns to look at her. "I was at home, of course."

Asuma asks, "Not at work?"

The boy turns to him. "Should I have been?"

Asuma gives a dangerous smile, toothpick hanging loosely. "What do you do for a living, Itachi?"

"I don't see how that's any of your business," comes the deep voice. He stands and turns the other way, slipping on a light jacket and closing his eyes. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go… funeral arrangements."

The crowd of dirty, rowdy men parts, making a path for the boy as he walks out of the bar. It becomes silent as a grave until the door finally swings closed with a bone-chilling creak.

Asuma watches him leave with narrowed eyes, chewing thoughtfully on his toothpick, and from his side Kurenai sighs, smoothing her hair.

"We didn't get nearly enough information," she states, sounding thoroughly frustrated.

"Hm." Asuma gets up to leave, and his partner follows. On the way out, his cell rings, and he answers it outside on the dreary sidewalk.

He turns to Kurenai after hanging up a short moment later.

"The lab has something for us."

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I feel oddly unaffected by the fact that Sasuke does not yet know my name, and I feel my face get hot when he tests it out.

"Sakura," he says slowly. I nod. He continues, "Your parents lack creativity."

I think very nasty thoughts in my head, but only say, "Bite me."

He snorts. "Apparently the apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

I stand up abruptly, and turn away because I can feel my nostrils flare, and I walk down the steps to stand on the walkway.

"Look," I say, "If we're just going to sit here and listen to you insult me the whole day, I really don't see the point of staying and listening to…"

I began to walk away somewhere in the middle of my tirade, but suddenly he is right in front of me, a true ghost, and I can feel my heart stop before I finish the sentence breathlessly, looking into his eyes, the deep ruby color of fresh blood.

"…you."

He says nothing, and I have to take a step back because he is too close and it is unnerving, being so close to death.

"Don't," he finally speaks, and it sounds like it takes a large amount of effort. "Don't… leave."

I swallow. My throat feels thick with something I can't name. "And why shouldn't I?"

"I have an idea," he says simply. "I know someone we can go to, someone that can help us."

"Help _you_," I correct, recovering and still upset.

"Sure," he responds, unconvinced.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"Please tell me you've got something good for us Shizune," Asuma whines to the forensic scientist.

"Well, nothing totally concrete," Shizune says wandering over to them. "We had the murder weapon analyzed…"

She picks up a file and leafs through it shortly. "The serial number was scratched off of course, and there were no fingerprints, not even partials. All ballistics could do was match the bullets to the gun."

The two detectives visibly deflate.

"But," Shizune continues, "We also analyzed the note that was left with the weapon."

"And?" Kurenai asks, walking closer.

"The ink wasn't ink." Shizune lifts the original note up, carefully, with her gloved hands. "We examined it, and found out it was blood."

"Human?"

"Yes, unfortunately." She places the note back down, staring intently at the small, scrawled letters, thin and dark. "We took a small sample and compared it to the DNA database, but so far there are no matches."

"Just one good thing after another," Asuma quips sarcastically, and Shizune turns to stare darkly at him.

"Excuse Asuma, please," Kurenai says. "The Chief is riding us pretty hard on this case. The kid's deceased dad used to be a police chief himself. Plus the press is hounding us from all sides. It's a lot to handle."

Shizune sighs, waving a dismissive hand and smiling. "No worries, I know he meant nothing by it."

"I _am_ still in the room, you know." Asuma lifts an eyebrow.

Shizune puts the file back down, ignoring him, and then turns back to the detectives with a grim expression. "There's one more thing," she says.

"What would that be?"

Shizune hesitates and then moves for the door. "I'd have to show you."

The detectives share a look and then follow the department head down the hall, and they arrive at the morgue, cold and filled with steel drawers.

Shizune goes to one in particular, and pulls it open, and the Uchiha boy's body is laying there on the metal slab, chalky and colorless, a faded version.

"But…" Kurenai's eyes rove over Sasuke, brow furrowed. She brushes a hand over his cold forehead, and Asuma winces, and she pulls her long fingers away quickly, as if she has been burned. "His wounds…."

Asuma walks a little closer from where he was hanging back, peering over Kurenai's slim shoulder, he's never liked seeing the bodies after they were labeled and thrown into storage, it seems too heartless to him.

"Where …are the bullet wounds?"

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

"Where are we going?" I ask for the millionth time, and for the millionth time Sasuke ignores me.

The sidewalks are crowed now, people out for lunch and scrambling for cover because there is a great black cloud in the sky that promises a wrathful storm.

We reach the subway station, and Sasuke leads me down the steps, and stops there, before we hit the densest part of the crowd.

"Do you have money?" he asks me, and when I shake my head he curses. "Then we'll have to sneak on."

My eyes widen, and I shake my head, and say, "No way am I going on the subway without a ticket. It's dishonest!"

"It's _necessary_."

"I don't care!" I lower my voice, in paranoia. "What do I do when the guy comes around to punch my ticket?"

Sasuke pinches the bridge of his nose. He can whine all he wants, I'm not budging on this. "Hide in the bathroom," he suggests through his teeth.

"Easy for you to say! You're invisible! You don't have to worry about getting caught!"

He glares flatly. "I would gladly switch places with you if I could."

I deflate. "But… I…"

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

I feel very, very guilty when we sneak onto the train to go and visit this mysterious person, and my stomach hurts out of nervousness or something else. I do as Sasuke says and hide out when the man with the hole-puncher comes around to check tickets, but the bathroom is very small and cramped, so Sasuke stays where we were sitting.

I return ten minutes later than he told me to, just to be careful and a little spiteful. The seats are hard and uncomfortable and I have to keep shifting so that my butt doesn't fall asleep.

It's pretty dead this time of day, so it isn't all that crowded, and Sasuke sits across the aisle from me. I look over at him every few seconds, where he sits, slumped, and notice the glow around him is a little stronger because it's more dim here.

One of the lights keeps blinking out, then on. I feel like I'm in some twisted horror movie.

I look at Sasuke one more time, get up, and sit down next to him.

"Hello," I say under my breath, glancing at the sparse other passengers.

"What."

"I…" A businessman and an older lady look up at me, and I cough and reach into the bag slung over my shoulder to pull out my cell. I hold it up to my ear.

"What are you doing?" Sasuke asks, sitting up and lifting an eyebrow.

"Hello?" I say into the phone. I see Sasuke roll his eyes and slump again.

"Yeah, I have some questions," I say into the phone. Sasuke looks at me, getting it.

"Like what?" he asks gruffly. The light flickers again, and he looks sinister and frightening with his pale skin and bright red eyes.

"Who is this guy?"

Sasuke thinks for a second or two. "My old guardian," he finally says, as if he has resigned to tell me the truth.

I pause and pretend to listen into the phone. I feel very stupid.

"And you're sure he can help?"

"Believe me," Sasuke says, giving a soft snort, "If he can't, no one can."

"Does he have a name?" I finally ask, because I will need something to call this supposed savior by.

Sasuke sighs. "Kakashi," he answers. "Kakashi Hatake."

I nod and slide the phone shut with finality.

**-o-o-o-o-o-o-**

**-PM-**


End file.
